The Way Home
by EstlinMarie
Summary: An AU in which Phil Coulson found Grant Ward as a young teenager, long before Garrett and Hydra, and raised him. In this story, Grant is testing the waters of young adulthood, navigating a blossoming relationship with Skye, and trying (and failing) to stay out of trouble. Grant is 15, Skye is 14, FitzSimmons to come.
1. Careless

"Grant," Coulson called sternly.

The fifteen-year-old appeared in the living room, defiance scrawled across his face. "What?"

Coulson raised his eyebrows, and Grant's arrogant look faltered. "You want to tell me where the hell you were?"

Grant shrugged. "Me and Skye were hanging out."

"Hanging out? At four in the morning?"

Grant looked away. "Yea."

"_Where_ were you 'hanging out?'" Coulson asked sharply, and for the first time the boy began to look nervous.

In the two years since Grant had come to live with him, he had changed. It had all been good changes, really—he had arrived a shell of a child, with the marks of lifelong abuse littering his fragile young body, and now he was strong and well-fed and confident. Even his new-found attitude was something that made Coulson feel almost relieved—when Grant had come as a battered twelve-year-old, he had barely spoken at all for fear of being either struck or sent away, and now, at least, he was confident that Coulson was never going to do either of those things.

Now, however, Coulson had to set some boundaries.

"Grant," he prompted firmly. "Where were you?"

"We…we went to a club. Kind of."

"A _club_? _Kind of_?"

Grant winced. "We… we got fake IDs and went to this club downtown. It was kind of boring, actually. We left early."

"It's four in the morning."

"We left at eleven."

"So you were just casually leaving a club downtown when you texted me saying you'd made it home safely for the night, just in time for curfew?" Coulson asked, folding his arms and setting his jaw.

"I"—Grant began, and then shook his head.

"Lied to me," Coulson finished the sentence. "You lied to me."

Grant scuffed his toe against the carpet, carefully avoiding Coulson's gaze. "That wasn't all."

Coulson raised his eyebrows, waiting for Grant to speak.

"We uh…we…well, we went down to a party at the lake. Someone had a bonfire, and…it was a bunch of SHIELD cadets, so they were drinking and then having…uh….shooting competitions. And I…I was part of it."

"You were _what_?" Coulson snapped. "You were drinking at some party with people years older than you, people with _guns_, and you decided it would be a good idea to get involved with some half-assed drunk shooting competition?"

Grant swallowed hard. "Yea," he whispered, staring at the ground.

Coulson bit his lip. "Okay," he said. "Your room. Now." He jabbed his finger in the direction of Grant's room and then turned away.

"Where are you going?" Grant asked as Coulson grabbed his jacket.

"I need space to think," Coulson said shortly.

"At four in the morning?" Grant said. "It's not safe"—

"That didn't seem to stop you," Coulson snapped. "Grant. Room. Now."

Grant obeyed finally, and Coulson exited his apartment, struggling to control his anger.

The boy could have been killed.

Coulson had actually heard about the party from a senior agent at the academy about half an hour ago—it was why he had headed home from the op briefing early and discovered Grant's absence—and one very drunk cadet had been shooting in the competition and had been hit and critically injured by his own ricocheting bullet.

The cool pre-dawn air hit his face with a slap of cold, and he caught his breath.

There was the matter of Skye, too.

The girl was a year younger than Grant—only fourteen—and the two were best friends. She was as wild and high-spirited and daring as Grant, if not more so, and Grant should have known better than putting her in so much danger.

Coulson sighed.

Grant was just a kid, after all. A kid who had screwed up trying to impress a girl.

And he was also Coulson's kid, which was already a dangerous position, and a legacy kid with pre-acceptance into the S.H.I.E.L.D. academy contingent on high school completion, which was an added danger.

Safety dictated that there was no room for screwing up this big, and Coulson was dreading teaching Grant that lesson.

Coulson sat down on a bench along the path that ran along behind his apartment building, and sighed heavily. Worry—well, more like panic, if he was honest with himself—and anger had sent adrenaline spiking through his body, and he was tired now that it had dissipated.

"Oh, Grant," he muttered softly, shaking his head and rubbing a weary hand across his face. This boy was going to be the death of him.

Coulson stood slowly, realizing that he was dreading the coming conflict with his adopted son much more than Grant probably was.

When he re-entered the apartment, he went straight to Grant's room and knocked. "Meet me in my office," he said briefly.

Grant had changed into sweat pants and a t-shirt, and he arrived in Coulson's study looking exhausted and much younger than usual, his dark hair spiking out at all angles and his eyes growing heavy with exhaustion.

Coulson motioned for him to sit down, and Grant did, not meeting Coulson's eyes.

When Coulson didn't speak, Grant looked up finally. "Dad," he began in a small voice. "I—I'm sorry."

Coulson pursed his lips and then nodded. "Thanks, kid," he said quietly. "How about you tell me the rest of the story. Did you drink?"

Grant shook his head, and then hesitated. "I just had a sip. I wasn't drunk."

"At the club or at the party?"

"The party," Grant said, head down.

Coulson reached out and tipped the boy's chin up so he was forced to meet Coulson's eyes. "Talk to me, Grant, not to the floor."

Grant swallowed hard. "Sorry."

"Did you take Skye home?"

"Yea."

"Did she drink?"

"No."

"Were Tony or Pepper up when she got home?"

"No."

Coulson sighed.

"Are you gonna tell them?"

Coulson looked down at the boy for a long moment. "Yea," he said finally. "I think I need to."

"I don't want to get Skye in trouble."

"If you were concerned about that, I think you should have thought about that _before_ you took her to a club and to a dangerous, very _adult_ party," Coulson said sternly.

Grant looked away again. "What are you going to do?" he asked finally, his voice small.

Coulson sighed, looking down at him. Finally, he stood. "Come with me."

"What? Where are we going?"

"Grab a sweatshirt," Coulson ordered, ignoring his question. "And come with me."

Fifteen minutes later, they pulled up outside the S.H.I.E.L.D. medical facility.

"What are we doing here?"

"Paying a visit," Coulson said shortly. "This way."

Grant followed him inside and up to the room where the injured cadet was being cared for.

"Your party," Coulson said briefly. "That's how it ended."

Grant went completely white, and Coulson grabbed his arm to steady him. "What"—

"That's what happened when you have shooting competitions that involve inexperienced drunk kids trying to hit a target that bullets can ricochet off of," Coulson said, his hand closing more firmly around Grant's arm. "They don't know if he's going to live."

"I was—I was standing right next to him," Grant whispered, shaking his head and turning to Coulson, his eyes wide. "I must have left right before it happened."

Coulson let out his breath in a long _whoosh_. "You could have died tonight," he said, and he saw the weight of his words sinking into Grant. "Come with me?"

"Are we—are we going home?"

"Not yet."

They drove up to a cemetery five minutes later.

This time, Grant didn't ask questions as he followed Coulson up the hill towards the gravestones. He shivered slightly, and Coulson reached over and wrapped his own jacket over the kid's shoulders.

They stopped in front of a gravestone near the edge of the graveyard.

"I was here when that ground was newly turned," Coulson said quietly. "You know Agent Victoria Hand? We buried her son here. He was fourteen. Skye's age, younger than you. If he had lived, he would have joined the academy like you plan to. If he had lived, he would have been another reckless legacy kid growing up in S.H.I.E.L.D. If he had lived. But on the night before his fifteenth birthday, he snuck out and got drunk by the lake with a bunch of cadets who were years older than him. He drank too much—alcohol poisoning—and he didn't make it until the morning when he would have turned fifteen. And now he's here." Coulson gestured towards the tombstone, the cold granite looking bleak and hard in the gray pre-dawn.

Grant was shaking, and whether it was from the cold or from what he had just heard, Coulson couldn't tell.

Coulson sighed and then wrapped his arm over the boy's shoulders, and Grant leaned closer to him.

"You ready to go?"

Grant nodded.

When they arrived home, Coulson led Grant back into his office and sat down across from him.

"Do you understand why I showed you those things?" Coulson drilled the boy with a look that would have cowed most of his agents.

"Yes, sir," Grant whispered, still shivering a little.

Coulson reached out and wrapped an arm over Grant's shoulders again. "You need to get to bed, kid," he said finally, standing.

Grant remained seated, staring up at him. "You're not going to punish me?"

Coulson hesitated for a long moment. "Do I need to?" he asked finally, his voice sharp even though it was quiet. "Do you plan on sneaking out and lying to me and putting yourself in danger like that ever again?"

Grant shook his head. "No, sir," he said emphatically. "I'm sorry. I'm really, really sorry."

Coulson nodded. "Then no, I'm not going to punish you. But if you _ever_ pull something like that again—if you ever put yourself in that much danger—I'll take you over my knee and give you a spanking to remember. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," Grant said in a small voice, and this time Coulson pulled him into his arms.

"I'm sorry I had to be that harsh with you, kid," he said softly, and Grant returned the hug when Coulson's arms tightened around him. "But I've seen kids buried, and I'm not going to bury you, okay? I'm not going to lose you."

"You won't," Grant murmured, his words muffled against Coulson's shirt. "I promise."


	2. Reassurance

After the disastrous night of the party, Grant Ward promised himself that he wasn't going to be any trouble for Coulson. There was, of course, that still, small part of him that almost believed Coulson would still kick him out if he ever went too far.

As it turned out, however, Grant Ward wasn't so good at keeping promises to himself.

He didn't mean to cause trouble, he really didn't.

It was just that Skye's dark eyes shone bright when she mentioned _night out by the lake_ and his teenage brain went into overdrive immediately. It was just that Coulson had already told him he would be managing a night op from the nearby Hub and wouldn't be home until morning.

Usually, Steve would come and stay so Grant wouldn't be alone for a night—actually, Grant thought, crinkling his nose in annoyance, Steve and Coulson usually spent their nights together, anyway—but he was leading the op from the ground, so they were both going to be gone until early the next morning.

So when Skye asked him to go to Tony's lake house that night (without Tony or Pepper's permission, of course)—just the two of them—Grant said yes despite his trepidation about staying out late again.

It was perfect and moonlit and everything he had imagined—and dangerous.

He wasn't sure how it all happened, but he _was_ sure that he was the one who suggested breaking into Stark's liquor cabinet, and he was also sure that he was the one who suggested they go downtown to see some live music.

Skye, being Skye, acquiesced readily, and hacked a website hawking tickets for latecomers to download tickets for the two of them.

They weren't drunk, exactly, just pleasantly buzzed, and Skye figured it would be okay to drive one of Tony's Lamborghinis. She had a fake ID—of _course_ she had a fake ID—proclaiming that she was sixteen and hold enough to drive, and another one that said she was twenty-one and old enough to get into a club.

He didn't know which driver's license she was using, but either way, he knew they were screwed if they were caught.

They weren't caught, exactly—but they were very wasted.

And Skye decided it would be a good idea to get behind the wheel of the car (even drunk, Ward knew that wasn't a good idea, but he didn't say anything because this was Skye and because his mind was just a little too fuzzy).

They survived.

Remarkably, they survived.

Unfortunately, Tony's Lamborghini didn't.

There wasn't another car—thank _god_ there wasn't another car—but there was a particularly narrow road that had a wall on one side. A cement wall.

And Lamborghini + cement wall was not a recipe for success.

The car swerved wildly, striking the wall, and Skye swore and swerved again, into the other lane. They were outside of town again, on their way back to Tony's lake house, and Grant felt fear finally kick in.

When they arrived, remarkably alive and unhurt, Skye parked it in the back of the garage.

"I'm dead," she said, and then swore loudly, staggering just a little bit.

Grant caught her arm, helping her balance. "Coulson'll throw me out on my ass for this," he said, realizing he wasn't drunk enough to have to think about that possibility. "I need another drink."

"No," Skye said, panic in her slurring tones. "No more. We can't. We're already in so much trouble."

"Are you going to tell them?" he asked, clenching his hands in an attempt to stop the shaking.

Skye looked at him. "I'm not going to say you were part of it," she said, her voice surprisingly clear. Apparently, fear had a sobering effect on both of them. "Coulson doesn't have to know."

"That's not fair to you," Grant shook his head.

"It'll be okay," Skye tried to say. "Coulson won't be too mad"—

And then a second later she was bent over puking on the ground.

He got her home safely, and it was Happy who met them at the door, surprise and then concern spreading across his face.

"You both drunk?" he asked gruffly, taking Skye's arm firmly.

"Not anymore," Grant said.

"Is Pepper up?" Skye asked, her face still pale. "I'm sober…sober enough. And I need to talk to her."

"I'll say you do," Happy said, and then Tony appeared behind him and Skye groaned.

Tony looked at Grant, who in turn looked at the ground. "What the hell"—he began, and then stopped. "Happy, take Grant home. Skye, come inside."

Skye sent one last apologetic look at Grant, and then disappeared inside next to Tony. God, of course Tony Stark was still going to be up at 1:30 in the morning. It wasn't that Tony would think to call Coulson and tell him that Grant was out drunk with his daughter until almost 2 am, but Grant knew it would probably come up in conversation the next time Tony saw Coulson.

There was no way around it now.

He had to tell Coulson.

The car ride home was silent, and Grant was grateful that at least Happy wasn't lecturing. He'd hear enough from Coulson—and Steve, too, most likely.

That is, if he stuck around long enough to hear it.

Happy walked him to the door—probably assuming (correctly) that Grant might bolt otherwise—and Grant felt fear spread cold through the pit of his stomach. Coulson wasn't home yet, and neither was Steve, but he would have to tell Coulson.

And Grant was so tired, so _damn _tired, of watching people walk away as soon as they saw the truth that he considered running away then and there.

So he stayed, hands shaking as he sat on the couch, at the very edge as if he would need to be ready to run if he had to.

Coulson didn't arrive home until nearly four in the morning, and Grant could barely keep his eyes open. Coulson entered, setting his keys on the counter and slipping out of his shoes before he saw Grant waiting on the couch.

Surprise, quickly replaced with concern, flashed across Coulson's face. "Grant! What's wrong? What are you doing up?"

Grant clenched and un-clenched his fists. "I'm sorry," he said feebly, and Coulson was at his side in a second, his hand gentle on Grant's shoulder.

"What happened?" Coulson asked softly, drilling Grant with that look. "Are you hurt?"

He shook his head.

"Is anyone else hurt? Skye? Did something happen?"

Another shake of his head.

Gently, Coulson pulled Grant to his feet and into his arms. "Tell me what happened," he said softly, but his voice was firm.

"You're going to hate me," Grant said, too exhausted to realize that Coulson had smiled slightly at his dramatic response.

"No," Coulson said firmly. "I'm not."

"You don't know that," Grant said shakily. "You don't know what I've done."

"I _do_ know that," Coulson said. "I love you. That's not contingent on what you do."

"I went to the Starks' lake house outside of town with Skye," Grant said, the words mashing together as he said them all in a rush. "And we got drunk and she drove and we went downtown and then she drove us back and she swerved and the car hit the median and she's fine but the car is wrecked and we hitchhiked home and Skye puked and I thought you wouldn't want to take me back."

Coulson let out a long breath, his arms tightening around Grant. "Are both of you okay?" he asked quietly.

"You don't hate me?"

"Of course I don't," Coulson said soothingly, and Grant buried his face against him.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I don't—I don't know what I was thinking. I shouldn't have snuck out late. I shouldn't have done any of that"—

His voice was dangerously close to breaking, so he decided to stop talking completely, and Coulson seemed to understand.

"You need sleep," Coulson said gently. "Tomorrow's Saturday, and you and I can both sleep in—I've got the next couple of days off—and we can talk in the morning. Come on. Let's get you to bed."

Grant nodded sleepily. Coulson hadn't yelled, hadn't smashed anything or knocked anything over, hadn't turned and walked coldly away—to be frank, Grant had no idea how to respond to a parent who didn't react with anger, whether that was cold anger or violent anger.

"Are you mad at me?" he asked.

"No," Coulson sighed. "But you ran off and put yourself in a lot of danger tonight, kiddo, so you're not off the hook. We both need sleep before we talk it over, though. Okay?"

Grant nodded, heading into his bedroom. Coulson followed, pulling the covers up over Grant when he climbed, exhausted, into bed.

He was out before his head hit the pillow.

When Grant woke the next morning, it was to the sun already high outside his window and the smell of breakfast cooking.

"You up?" Coulson was at the door.

Grant moaned, rubbing his aching head. Alcohol wasn't worth it, even if it was just in consideration of the killer headache that came with his hangover. "Yea," he mumbled. "I'm up."

"Steve's making breakfast," Coulson said. "But I want you to shower and get dressed, and then meet me in my office before breakfast first, okay?"

Grant groaned again, and rolled out of bed.

He was out of the shower in a few minutes, dread building in his gut as he made his way down the hallway to Coulson's office.

Coulson looked up when he entered, but Grant couldn't meet his gaze.

Coulson waited for a long moment, and then he stood, crossing the room so that he was standing in front of Grant. He leaned against the wall behind him, folded his arms, and looked down at Grant. "So," he said quietly. "How about you tell me the whole story?"

Grant continued to stare at the floor.

"Grant."

"I'm sorry," Grant whispered.

"Hey," Coulson said firmly. "Look at me. I need to know what happened, kiddo."

Grant swallowed. "Skye and I went to the Stark's lake house."

"Just the two of you?"

"Yes."

"Did Tony or Pepper know?"

"No. And then we…got drunk."

"Your idea or Skye's?"

Hesitation. "Mine." Grant paused again, but Coulson just stood there, waiting. "And then we…I thought it would be fun…well, we drove downtown."

"When you were drunk?"

Grant nodded. "On the way back, Skye…well, she swerved and Tony's Lamborghini hit the median and then she swerved into the other lane. But…but we got back to the lake house, and then we…we hitchhiked home."

"You _hitchhiked_?" Coulson interrupted, and Grant winced.

"Yea."

"With who?"

He shrugged. "I don't—I don't know—I didn't pay much attention."

"You know how dangerous that is?" Coulson said sharply. "Two drunk kids climbing into a stranger's car? You could have been kidnapped—you could have been three states away by now, hurt or worse—and none of us would have been any the wiser. Did you at least have your phone on you?"

Grant nodded his head, and Coulson let out his breath in a long _whoosh_.

"Is there anything else you want to add?" Coulson asked quietly, and Grant shook his head. "Okay," Coulson said, and Grant saw the reluctance in his face. "Do you remember what I said last time—about what would happen if you broke curfew and put yourself in danger again?"

Grant stared at the floor. "Yes," he whispered. "I remember."

Coulson sighed heavily. "Come here, then," he said quietly. "Let's get this over with."

Coulson knew he couldn't go easy on the boy—not when he had put himself and Skye at risk once again, not when being the son of a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent was already such a risky position—but he hadn't guessed it would be as difficult as it was to discipline Grant. The boy was crying by the time they were finished—and so was Coulson, who rubbed his arm over his eyes in an attempt to hide it.

He pulled the boy into his arms, and Grant buried his face against Coulson's shoulder. "I'm sorry," he mumbled, his words muffled against Coulson's shirt, and Coulson rubbed his hand soothingly across the boy's back.

"I know, kiddo," he said, trying to keep the emotion out of his own voice. "And it's okay. We're okay."

He must not have succeeded, though, because Grant looked up at him suddenly, and then wrapped his arms around Coulson.

"Were you crying?" Grant asked him, his words muffled again.

"No," Coulson said.

"Liar," Grant said, and Coulson grinned slightly.

"Okay, maybe."

"Sorry," Grant said again, and Coulson tightened his arms around the boy. "About—about all of it."

_Me too_, Coulson wanted to say. _I'm sorry, too, and I pray to god I never have to do something like this ever again. _

"You okay?" he asked Grant finally, and the boy nodded.

"I won't be running any more late-night ops," Coulson told him, and Grant's head snapped up.

"What"—

"It's not that I don't trust you," Coulson continued. "Because I do"—

"You shouldn't," Grant said, looking down. "Not after this."

Coulson shook his head. "I trust you, kid," he said. "Everyone screws up sometimes, and that doesn't mean you've lost my trust. But I dropped any night ops because I didn't think it was fair to you to force you to stay home alone all those nights when I wasn't back until two or three in the morning. So I told Fury this morning that I was done with night ops"—

"Aren't most ops night ops?" Grant asked curiously.

"A lot of them are," Coulson said. "That doesn't matter."

"Of course it matters," Grant said. "S.H.I.E.L.D. _matters _to you, I know it does. You can't give up something you love"—

"For something I love more?" Coulson interrupted, and Grant stared at him. "You matter more, kid. You always have."

Grant stared at him, open-mouthed, as if he couldn't comprehend what Coulson was saying. Finally, he spoke. "I wasn't going to tell you," he said. "Skye was going to cover for me, and I wasn't going to tell you, because I thought you'd—I thought you'd walk away. I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. I shouldn't have—I should have known better."

Coulson felt gutted by the words. "Oh, Grant," he said softly, pulling the boy close. "I'm not going anywhere."


End file.
